Wednesday, October 23, 2013

FROM This Chef Wannabe: Pesto Pasta Salad

Last night, I made Pesto Pasta Salad to satisfy my craving for pesto and cheeses. The first time I made it, I Pinterested and Googled recipes for it. I've probably made it around 4 times now but last night was special -- I made it my own.

Here's how.

I had a lot of produce that I had to go through in our fridge. The recipes I looked up called for cherry tomatoes, olives (kalamata, or otherwise), mozzarella and parmesan. Well, I only had tomatoes and I ran out of mozzarella. I also thought I'd use my red cabbage and kale as fillers -- the more veggies, the better. As for cheese, I only had feta.

~* Pesto Pasta Salad *~

Ingredients:rotini pastacherry tomatoes (sliced in half) or plum tomatoes (slice in quarters) kalamata olives (sliced in half or quarters) or just oliveskale (torn in bite size)red cabbage (sliced)feta cheesemozzarella cheeseparmesan cheesepestoInstructions:Cook pasta according to box instructions. Drain and coat with pesto and parmesan. Let cool or chill in the fridge for about 30 minutes.Mix all vegetables after slicing/cutting.Toss the cheeses in.Add in pasta.If you want more of the pesto taste, you can add more according to your fancy.

I l❤ve making colorful dishes. I always try to be different colored bell peppers and the red cabbage -- I l❤ve purple -- and of course, lots of greens.

Next time I make this, I'm going to throw in mozzarella with feta. It will then be called Triple Cheese Pesto Pasta Salad.